A Little Christmas Cheer
by Redlance-ck
Summary: It's Christmas time at the Warehouse, but Myka's not really feeling the season's cheer. That is until a visitor arrives. [One-shot]


**Disclaimer: **Warehouse 13, the world and the characters that inhabit it do not belong to me in any way, though sometimes I lie away at night wishing that they did and what I'd do with them if they did. And then I write those thoughts down.

**A/N:** Shout out to Three who screamed and flailed accordingly but was ENTIRELY unhelpful when faced with a decision. ILU. :P

* * *

The Warehouse rarely paid attention to the calendar. Be it birthday, July fourth, Thanksgiving or Christmas, Artie's annoyingly accurate mantra of "artifacts wait for no one" was, well, just that. Between freaky ghostly Santa Clauses and Pete's misadventure the previous year that he **still** wasn't telling anyone about, it seemed as though the Warehouse might be preparing them for a new holiday tradition. But as Christmas Eve rolled around and the dreaded jingle bell-ping still hadn't arrived to put a dampener on the festivities, each agent of Warehouse 13 quietly began to accept, hope even, that maybe this year they'd be able to celebrate undisturbed.

Well, Claudia wasn't doing anything quietly, and had been squealing and hollering and singing Christmas songs at the top of her lungs since the beginning of December. With the potential of an undisturbed Christmas, her exuberance had been bumped up a few notches that morning and Myka and Steve had exchanged smiles over the breakfast table as the redhead had all but danced into the dining room wearing a Santa hat that she'd positively drenched in tinsel and proceeded to tac mistletoe to almost every available surface. All in all, it was shaping up to be a pretty good Christmas.

The mug of hot chocolate – an insisted upon Claudia tradition – warmed her hands as she held it, curled against the arm of the sofa, peering into the flames dancing about in the fireplace. The rest of her team were in Claudia's room playing a game that involved zombies and Santa, or maybe a zombie-Santa, and her mind was a world away. Though if you'd stirred her from her reverie and asked where she'd been, she wouldn't have been able to tell you. Her thoughts were too deep and a little too jumbled to find and make sense of. But that was perfectly okay, because she had no plans to do either.

Snow fell from the darkening sky outside to coat the flat expanse of the South Dakota landscape like a blanket, its perceived chill making everyone indoors feel that little bit more cosy. Leena's always looked so beautiful this time of year and she'd always put in a superhuman effort when it came to decorating. Without her, they'd managed to do an okay job, but something was missing. Something that they'd never be able to figure out or replicate, but while her touch was gone, Leena herself still lingered. Her presence was felt in every room of the house and occasionally they'd catch a glimpse of her, disappearing around a corner or smiling at them in their periphery. Pete saw her more, and Claudia had confessed to dreams that felt too real to be imagined, and Myka was just happy that the woman was still keeping an eye on them. She always had been a bit of a mother hen.

Artie was recovering, slowly. He hadn't said anything but Myka couldn't help but wonder if Leena had maybe visited him, in one way or another, once the world ending crisis had been averted and things had begun to calm down as much as they ever did. Piece by piece, their family was coming together again.

Though for Myka, there was a shard the size of Earth still missing, a rather large piece of her world drifting in an unnamed sea somewhere beyond the boundaries of Leena's, of South Dakota, maybe even outside of the States. It seemed as though H.G. Wells and 'secrets' were pretty well destined. Perhaps even more than she and Myka were.

Myka craned her neck to the left, rotating her head a little to work out a crick that had started to settle. She straightened and brought her mug to her lips, blowing across the liquid's dark surface out of habit rather than necessity, and took a sip. The iPod that Claudia had slipped into its docking station that afternoon was still running through its apparently endless playlist of Christmas music and they'd been little more than cheerful static accompanying Myka's thoughts, but her ears tuned in as 'Little Dummer Boy' started playing and she smiled as she took another sip, tip of her tongue sweeping a tiny, half-melted marshmallow into her mouth.

She didn't really have any Christmas traditions of her own. Growing up, she'd mostly sat back and watched Tracy and her mother decorate the tree, though she usually helped her dad throw a few around the book store. Her mom had almost always baked gingerbread men cookies. But cookies really were more Artie's territory and there was only so many decorations you could put up around the Warehouse without running the risk of one of them turning into an artifact. She was content to partake in the traditions of others though, but sometimes she wondered whether or not she'd ever have one of her own.

Unbidden, a memory that had laid long dormant at the back of Myka's mind, buried beneath holographic projections and the rubble of the Warehouse that had, now, never existed, was pulled to the forefront of her thoughts. They'd been hunting down an artifact in Banff, Alberta, when they'd passed a store that seemed to be in a perpetual state of Christmas. They'd stood at the window for a few moments, H.G. admiring the old fashioned looking dolls decked out in faux fur and the little crystal figures of polar bears and snowmen, and Myka studying the other woman's reflection in the glass. Helena had told her how it had been tradition in her time to make gifts and that those that were home-made seemed to hold so much more meaning, all the effort and love that had been poured into them. She'd told Myka about the little tin solider she'd made Christina one year, how it marched when wound up, how she was still sometimes blinded by the smile her daughter had worn upon opening the gift. And then Helena had grown quiet, and eventually they'd moved on.

Looking back, Myka couldn't help but see those sombre moments as screams for help that she hadn't been able to hear.

The soft crooning of Mud's 'Lonely This Christmas' sifted from the speakers, chorus roughly jerking her from her thoughts, and she rolled her eyes, letting her head fall against the back of the couch. Christmas songs were supposed to be happy, they were supposed to inspire joy. Not inspire you to drink shots until you passed out.

Flipping the blanket she'd draped over her legs to the side, she placed her mug on the end table next to the couch and hauled herself to her feet with a huff. Her socked feet padded soundlessly across the carpet as she directed her pyjama-clad form to the opposite side of the room and hastily punched the skip button on the device. She stood there for a moment, hands braced against the top of the dresser that housed the 'good' tableware as the next song started playing, eyes unblinking as they stared at the bright white screen with the scrolling text.

She was okay, she was. And the more she told herself, the more convincing it sounded.

With a shake of her head, she moved through the open doorway and headed for the kitchen, thirsty for something other than the cloyingly sweet taste of liquid chocolate. Her lacklustre efforts found her draining a glass of tap water a few moments later and she deposited the empty glass in the sink once she was done, before staring sombrely out of the window at the snow-covered back yard. It looked so peaceful.

She heard the sound of the front door opening and closing with quiet clicks and blew out a long breath, closing her eyes to gather herself. Artie, mostly likely, finally relieving himself of paperwork or ping-watching or whatever he'd seen fit to occupy himself with for the majority of Christmas Eve. He'd baked cookies the night before, then hidden them away in an attempt to stop Pete from sniffing them out, and Myka was certain that the second her partner heard the older man's voice, he'd come bounding down the stairs like an impatient puppy, begging for treats. The image brought a smile to her lips, lifting their corners, and she turned to wander back into the sitting room to welcome the no doubt snow-speckled man before Pete could start plying him for the good stuff.

But the dark eyes that met hers as she came to a dead stop on the threshold between the two rooms didn't belong to Artie and all the ways in which she'd learned to greet people, in all the languages she'd mastered, vanished without a single trace.

Helena.

She couldn't speak the name, barely remembered she was in possession of something called a mouth that moved and functioned just as she wanted it to if she thought about it hard enough, but it was whispered to her, inside her head. So quiet, so deafening. And she couldn't recall ever feeling her breath catch so painfully in her chest before. She remembered, acutely, each sob that had stuck there, each angry wail. She remembered every mournful, anguished cry that had been ripped from that very same spot – part of her even remembered the ones that hadn't happened, not really, not to this version of herself – but nothing had ever felt quite like this. As if despair itself had been so close to escaping, and then hope had grown talons and clutched at it, holding it in place, piercing it along with herself.

Her ink-black hair was peppered with rapidly melting snowflakes and others had been caught by the shoulders of her knee-length overcoat and the grey wool scarf woven loosely about her neck, but they were gone before Myka really registered them. Not that she was registering much beyond Helena's presence. Maybe the sparkle of life in her eyes, the one that assured Myka that H.G. was real and solid, or the blush at her cheeks that let Myka know she was affected by the cold. And she knew that H.G. was H.G. again, freed from the prison of the Janus coin, of course she knew. But fear was a powerful thing and Myka had had too many moments left alone to daydream. Helena's hands were gloved, swathed in a deep purple that disappeared into the sleeves of her jacket, and they hung clasped before her as though she were waiting.

And that was when Myka finally looked at her. **Really** looked at her. Saw Helena instead of just feeling her presence. The blush that had blossomed across her cheeks made the rest of her skin seem paler than usual and her lips, reddened from the cold, were shaped into something that reminded Myka of a smile but hadn't quite reached it. It was pulled down at the corners by uncertainty, unable to flourish under the weight.

"Hello, Myka." And she'd never really felt one way or another about her name, but Helena always managed to make it sound special.

For a few seconds, ones that seem so much longer than the average, Myka simply stared at the woman standing before her. Unblinking, lest the vision vanish. She could feel her heart beating beneath her hand, the one she'd drawn up to lie against her chest at some point in time that she could no longer place, and the way her shoulders were rising and falling with even, shallow breaths that she couldn't feel. She felt a little bit numb, like her body wasn't entirely real. Like none of this was entirely real. Like she'd fallen asleep right there on the couch with her arm tucked beneath her head, cutting off enough of the flow of blood to make it tingle and all of this was just some mad but wonderful dream. One that would break if she spoke or moved or breathed too harshly.

"Won't you say anything?" But then H.G. was smiling at her, and Myka was back in a woodland clearing watching a woman who'd just asked her to be brave turn away, smiling that same utterly unconvincing smile. The one that was too wide, to cover the sorrow. The one that wavered at the edges, buckling under the strain of trying to keep it in place. It flickered to life across H.G.'s face, then fell away just as quickly, and its disappearance pulled the breath from Myka in a slow, shaky exhale.

"What are you doing here?" The question slipped out as a whisper, her face finally shifting from stunned blank mask to shadowed plains of confusion. Her brow furrowed and she shook her head as she spoke. And the way Helena operated, Myka had learned perhaps the hardest of ways, was under the cover of subterfuge. She was all controlled expressions and slight of hand, making you think she felt one thing whilst she was really feeling another. She worked in infinitesimal gestures; a twitch of her fingers, a quirk of her lips, a slight slump or squaring of her shoulders. A lie she told with her entire body, an existence of misdirections.

And Myka knew each and every one of them.

She saw the way H.G.'s already receding smile became nothing more than a memory, saw the way she blinked and pulled herself straighter, took a breath and lifted her chin ever so slightly. Saw the way her thumb twitched, mittened and all, against the side of her hand. Watched her swallow, flash another attempt at a genuine smile and then part her lips to speak.

"I was rather hoping to spend Christmas here." She said, carrying that familiar and playfully haughty tone with only a little less conviction than she had in the past. And then Myka's heart seemed to thump out of its usual rhythm as Helena's expression turned soft, became tinged with apprehension. "With you." And then all her heart did was ache. "With all of you." Helena added after a moment, taking Myka's prolonged silence in god knows what way. She was still too stunned, that Earth-sized wound still too raw, and she'd seen far too many things that weren't really there to trust whatever it was that was in front of her.

"Are you-" Her voice was rough, for reasons she had to push away, and she cleared her throat to try again. "You're... here." And it didn't sound like much of one, but the question was there and she knew Helena would hear it. H.G. nodded, hair shifting like waves of silk with the motion.

"I am." She confirmed, glancing down to rid herself of the gloves that had done their job outside but were now keeping her hands too warm. She deposited them into the respective pockets of her jacket and tentatively met Myka's gaze through long lashes. "To stay." The words were breathed, not spoken, whispered as though saying them any louder might render them no longer true. "If you'll have me." There was a niggling, far distant urge to laugh at that. One that would never have its moment of course, but one that was there nonetheless.

"If I'll have you?" Myka heard herself echo the words, heard the wondering confusion in her voice. She caught Helena's tell-tale intake of breath, even from across the room, and saw the way her eyes somehow became more focused. More intent. Myka's own narrowed, searching the face she'd only seen in fragments and in dreams for months now. The face that wore fear and hope as curves and lines of perfection. Annoyance, albeit a small spark of it, flared within Myka and she crossed her arms over middle. "Don't you know by now?" A sigh slipped from Helena, heavy with the weight of an explanation she'd yet to voice. She ducked her head as she took a step forward, then another, and another, until she was all of three feet from Myka.

"I know that I am lucky enough to have been given a second chance by people who have at their hands innumerable means of punishment." She said slowly, looking up once more. Myka's expression barely altered, but her forehead smoothed, just a little, as she listened. "I know that I am lucky to once more be in glorious solid form." And there it was, that verbal swagger that could swing from cocky to compensating and everywhere in between. "To feel snow against my skin and the bite of a bitter wind," she drew in a breath between her words, one that Myka knew was taken to steady her, "to simply be standing here before you now." And the way she said it, it was as though that was the only thing in the world that mattered to her. And Myka's heart gave another uneven beat as she resisted the urge to grip the frame of the door to keep herself upright. "But there is one thing that I shall never allow myself to assume." She continued, mouth forming the words carefully as she took a single step closer, eyes darting to the floor before being inevitably pulled back to Myka's. She had furrowed her brow and now peered at Myka pensively. "For I fear the toll that being wrong would take upon my heart might prove to be too much." And there it was, like a neatly wrapped package with nothing to take away from what was hidden beneath the colourful paper but the bow that finished it off. Helena was wearing her heart on her sleeve, as much as she would allow herself without being undeniably certain, and it clung to the cuff of her jacket, just shy of falling.

"You're not wrong." And then it leapt.

She watched as every inch of Helena's posture and demeanour slipped ever so slightly towards relief, watched as Helena herself let it happen without trying to stop it, and felt a weight lift from her own chest, and suddenly she could breathe again. Her lips curved, forming a half-smile, and her heart skipped a little as H.G. returned it. And a warmth bloomed, spilling over to seek out every corner of her body. Because Helena, for once, didn't argue against Myka's words. She simply accepted them for what they were; the truth. H.G. released a breath around her tremulous smile and brought a hand to her hair, sweeping her fingers though the strands from front to back.

Maybe it was the familiarity of the mannerism, the fact that she'd seen the woman do the exact same thing hundreds of times before, or maybe it had merely taken a while to truly sink in. Helena was there. Really there. Standing two feet away from her like some terribly clichéd Christmas miracle, undeniable presence bringing to mind all of the carefully worded sentences Myka had laid awake at night constructing, and then absently kicking them aside. Because at that moment none of them seemed to matter, not as much as the idea that Myka's hand wouldn't blur Helena's image if she reached out to touch her. But an idea, a hope, was all it would remain unless she tested it. So she did.

Her fingers brushed the inside hem of Helena's jacket until she was able to slip a finger inside and hook it over a cluster of threads that held one of the thick plastic buttons in place. Then she gave a slight, but persistent tug, and they were rather suddenly perhaps the closest that they'd ever been.

But of course, it wasn't sudden at all, and Myka knew that. They had been building to this since the moment they'd met.

She could feel Helena's gaze on her as she slipped her finger free and laid her hand flat against the soft material, and when Myka's eyes flicked upwards the only reason she wasn't floored by the burning intensity she encountered was because she'd expected it. Still, it stole her breath, and conscious of that, Myka glanced back to where her fingers were now brushing over H.G.'s lapel, a smile curving across her lips. She could hear the inventor's breathing, slow and controlled as it spilled from parted lips, and she fingered a thick edge of the lapel before moving to touch the soft, fuzzy fabric looped around her neck. And then it was barely a millimetre or two, and she was touching Helena's face.

The redness that had mottled her cheeks had abated, leaving them their usual shade of perfect porcelain, and her skin was no longer chilled as Myka suspected it had been upon first entering the house. She traced the line of a cheekbone with the tip of her index finger, eyes mapping its journey as it drifted down a parallel slope towards Helena's chin, and there Myka's hand stalled, curled around the line of her jaw. And now she felt the breaths leaving Helena as she brushed the pad of her thumb tenderly, almost reverently, over the other woman's lips. Then Myka released a sigh, one that screamed of willing submission and bore all the aural trademarks of someone finally reaching their long-awaited destination, and replaced her thumb with her lips.

Soft and gentle, at its surface it felt a lot like the handful of first kisses she'd shared with different people over the years. It was tentative and chaste and nobody was pushing for fear of a break. Helena wouldn't ever push, not this time, not until Myka let her know it was okay to. And it was hidden within that distinct lack of pushing that the difference between this kiss and all those other ones lay, because where Myka had been okay to wait and let the other person lead before, the simple press of lips to lips wasn't enough this time. Wasn't real enough for her. So with a more prominent dip of her head and a first sweep of her tongue, she relished the entry she was granted. And there was another thing that this kiss seemed to lord over all the others.

None of those had felt like coming home. They hadn't bore the same feeling of rightness, hadn't made her feel as though they'd done this a thousand times before. That they'd been meant for this since the beginning.

Helena's hands moved to lightly grip the taller woman at the waist and Myka was glad for the anchor, feeling herself grow more dizzyingly light-headed as the seconds ticked by unnoticed. She was aware, vaguely, of the music still playing in the background and she absently wondered if her feet were moving in time to a beat she wasn't really hearing as they took her back a little ways. The frame of the door was solid against her back, Helena's body warm and soft against her front, and against Myka's leg there was something that lingered between those qualities, the press of which distracted her enough to break the kiss. Albeit with some reluctance.

Myka blinked open her eyes in time to see H.G. blearily doing the same and she let the hand cradling the other woman's face fall to lie atop her shoulder as she glanced down towards where she'd felt the foreign object. She gestured to the now noticeable bulge, then embarrassingly had to let her mouth warm up for a few seconds before she could convince any words to leave it.

"That a grappler in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?" She asked, unable to dampen her amused curiosity despite the palpable intensity of the moment. The innuendo was not lost on Helena – the blame for that falling on Pete, Myka assumed – and the inventor let out a breathy chuckle as she followed Myka's gaze.

"Well, actually..." She tapered off with a sly wrinkle of her nose and took a half-step away from Myka as she unbuttoned her jacket. She slipped a hand inside and, with a winning smile, produced a new and improved version of that which had become a symbol of their beginning. Almost a metaphor for their entire relationship in a way. It had the ability to both send them soaring towards the heavens and plummeting towards the Earth, had stood the test of time until the world that had advanced around it did damage that had proved irrevocable. Then it had been gone, lost. Been mourned. And now it was returning, slimmer and sleeker; better for all its trials and tribulations. "There was talk of mine having perhaps met a rather heroic end?" Myka glanced up at the question, pulling her gaze from the object in Helena's hands.

"Oh." She murmured, muddled. Even the things Helena touched had a noble streak running through them it seemed. Myka smiled and gave a slight nod. "Yeah. Saved a bunch of people's lives. Nothing big." H.G. arched an eyebrow and, after a moment's pause, gave a rather pointed, haughty sniff.

"Yes, well, I thought perhaps you could use another, seeing as how the last proved to be such a boon in tight spots." And then, more quietly as she dropped her gaze to thumb the polished black hand grip, she added, "Such as elevator shafts." And Myka laughed, because she could.

"I thought I was supposed to owe you." She pointed out and watched as H.G.'s cheeks shifted with a smile and then dark eyes were back on hers.

"But you've already given me so very much." And not the first time Myka found herself wondering just how exactly the woman could pack such a devastating punch with simple words. She would be left to wonder too, as there were some mysteries that the universe didn't seem at all keen to explain. Myka couldn't say anything to that, didn't know where to even begin, and so she stood in silence as H.G. slipped the grappler back beneath the material of her coat. "However, you are to forget all about it until tomorrow, where you'll find it wrapped beneath the tree and shall proceed to react with nothing but surprise upon opening it." Still smiling, Myka narrowed her eyes.

"You're kinda bossy when it comes to Christmas presents." Helena raised both eyebrows this time, eyes twinkling with something so familiar that it made Myka's chest ache.

"You'll come to learn just how seriously Christmas traditions were taken in my household." And Myka beamed because yes, she would.

* * *

The front door of the bed and breakfast blew open and closed in the blink of an eye, snow drifting in on the biting breeze to dash the hallway and give the man shuffling his way in a last dusting. He grumbled something unintelligible as he unwound the scarf from around his neck and shrugged out of his jacket. Trailer came scurrying down the stairs to greet him, pawing at Artie's shoe before sitting and wagging his tail and allowing the man to pat his head.

"Good to see you too, boy." And although his murmur was low, it did not escape the ear of the creature lurking beyond, ready to pounce. Artie lifted his gaze towards the top of the landing as he heard a door open off the upstairs hallway. He'd barely begun to unlace his boots before Pete was flinging himself off the last step and all but barrelling into him.

"Artie, man, finally!" The younger man clapped a hand to his shoulder, almost knocking him sideways as he struggled with a boot. "We've been chomping at the bit, waiting to get the festive ball rolling." A dry laugh echoed somewhere behind him and Pete turned to find Claudia descending the stairs, Steve trailing in her wake.

"Uh, no. **You've** been driving us crazy because you have the mental capacity of a five-year-old and can't wait to chomp on Artie's cookies, and if he'd taken any longer the only balls that would have been rolling would have been-"

"Okay!" Steve interrupted, clapping his hands together and forcing a laugh. "How about them cookies?" They moved towards the sitting room together, walking as one, speaking as one, arguing and grumbling as one, but it was Claudia who reached the doorway first, using her smaller frame to her advantage in a plot to no doubt steal the cookies before Pete could lay a finger on them. And so it was she who shot arms out in both directions, barring the rest from entering and stunning them into silence.

"Holy donkey balls, Batman." She muttered, eyes like saucers and fixed dead ahead, and even Artie ignored the exclamation.

At the opposite end of the room, standing just inside the doorway and beneath a gleaming spring of mistletoe, Myka stood with her back against the frame and her arms at her side, hands pressed lightly against either side of the wall. Helena was pressed close to her, hands at Myka's hips and head tilted up just enough for their mouths to meet comfortably. Over and over as they exchanged easy, lazy, content kisses like they'd be doing this for years.

A sound leapt from the back of Claudia's throat, one that sounded a bit like a whimper and a lot like a smothered squeal, and it seemed to bring the accidental intruders back to themselves.

"Claudia!" Artie snapped, turning to face her as she spun in kind, and his gravelly bark appeared to be just the bucket of cold water that Myka and H.G. needed in order to yank them back to the real world. Their eyes popped open in unison and they angled their heads in the direction of the commotion. "I told you to leave Frig's mistletoe at the Warehouse! After last time-" Claudia flung up a hand, cutting him off.

"Chill, Mister Grinch, I **did**." She pointed towards the women watching them. Myka was only slightly more wide-eyed than usual and H.G., well there wasn't anything Claudia could think of that might fluster her. "That's just regular Christmas mistletoe working its magic." His mouth, still half-formed with the admonishment he'd been about to dole out, suddenly snapped into a thin line and she was sure, almost positive, she saw a blush starting to tinge his cheeks before he pushed past her.

"What happened last time?" Steve asked, bending to whisper in her ear. Claudia grinned.

"I'll tell you later." Artie made for his usual armchair and dropped into it, not saying another word until he glanced towards the two women over his shoulder.

"Well then, welcome back H.G., and now can we please make a start on all this Christmas stuff? Not all of us want to be stuck doing this stuff well into the wee hours." Myka rolled her eyes as Claudia pirouetted into the room, Steve and Pete wearing almost matching smiles as they followed her. When she was close enough, the redhead bent down to pinch the older man's cheeks, only just managing to dodge out of the way before he started slapping at her, and then she turned and practically bounced right into H.G. For a moment, the inventor froze, surprise stealing away all knowledge of how one was supposed to react to having arms wrapped about them in such a manner. But with Myka's smile came the memory and she returned the hug, patting Claudia lightly on the back for good measure.

"You **are** back, right?" The redhead asked once she'd pulled away and, after a glance towards Myka, Helena nodded. And it was a real, full-throated squeal that left Claudia then, and she gave H.G. a final squeeze before sprinting from the room with a quick, "I'll be right back." Steve caught her by the arm as she dashed by him, eyebrow raised questioningly.

"Where are you going?" She offered him a half shrug as she walked backwards out of the room.

"Apparently I have one long-assed thank you letter to write to Santa Claus."


End file.
